art say what?

VMFA: Not your grandmother’s art museum

Years and years ago, I was an intern at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA). It was one of the best internships experiences that I’ve ever had, and it gave me a chance to really familiarize myself with their holdings. Wonderful art aside, the actual galleries and exhibition spaces were slightly less than impressive. I have memories of dark rooms, low ceilings, and the fact that the library wasn’t accessible to the normal visitor (if my memory serves me correctly, if you were an outside researcher, you had to either talk to a librarian on the phone or make an appointment to come in). 

That has all changed.

Long story short, about three years ago (at least) TPTB decided to transform the museum into a space that could be considered to be one of the top museums in the United States. They did a gigantic expansion + renovation program which resulted in a sparkly new building placed on the site of the older extension, which was (and now is) attached to the older, original building with its classical facade. The new bit also included tacking on a sculpture garden along a gorgeously manicured slope and a glass-windowed cafe (a HUGE improvement on the former one, which I believe was in completely windowless). And, hooray, the library is now super sparkly and completely accessible to the casual visitor!

(Photo: Not me.)

Sadly, I didn’t photograph the outside or any of the other new additions with my camera (not really sure why not at the moment), but I did take some shots of the galleries, in particular the American art gallery. I felt totally at ease walking through the different rooms, mainly because they displayed the right combination of dec arts and paintings and the labels were incredibly informative. Maybe there could have been more Copley, Stuart, and West, but lack of eighteenth-century portraits aside, I think that they did a good job.

John Singleton Copley, Mrs. Isaac Royall (1767-9, and 1777-78). This painting, though not one of Copley’s best, was cool because he had painted over/altered her sleeve ruffles and jewels a few years after the original completion date. They had a picture of the x-ray on the label. So informative!

A small drop-front secretaire made in India for the British market (c. 1780), but bought in India by an American merchant on his way to China. It’s made from sandalwood, but veneered with incised ivory and black lac. 

Stiff colonial art! Oh, so stiff. But the furniture is lovely. Furniture makers must not have been as ostracized as painters were.

More still colonial people, children this time, who are again upstaged by the furniture surrounding them in the display. Believe me, I’m not complaining.

Neoclassicism has found its way to the colonies! Remember that Grecian couch from the MFA in Boston that I posted not too long ago? This is its not-as-stunning-but-still-nice cousin (1815-25, probably made in Philly). I believe they were built at around the same time, but definitely not by the same maker.

Interesting tapestries from eighteenth-century France. The subject matter was designed by Coypel (!) for Louis XV (I think, don’t quote me on that) and woven at the celebrated Gobelins manufactory. They’re scenes from Don Quixote and I believe that there are five in total. I love how they differ so greatly from other tapestries that you see from this time, i.e. the border is SO much thicker and embellished, making the main subject seem almost (if not totally) secondary. It’s more of a wall painting than a tapestry.

The Bruges Master, Madonna and Child Surrounded by Saints, 1499. I loved this piece; its colors are so much more vibrant in real life. Too bad not more is known about the artist.

They have a silver gallery!!! It’s a couple of rooms at least, but I sadly was rushing to get through everything at that point so I had to push on, but it seems like a great installation of American and European silver (lots of XVIIIº c. stuff), with explanatory didactic panels, and everything. V. impressed.

This lovely lady is part of a pendant pair by Gerard ter Borch (c. 1640). He’s just a spectacular, if not more intricate, but I just love the expression on her face. They’re both painted on copper and quite small (considering) so the details are that much sharper, yet fluid. 

Alfred Stevens, Woman in the Studio, 1862-65. I’ve always loved Belgian artists Alfred Stevens’s ladies, even though the late nineteenth century is not really a period that I usually say that I like. They’re always so carefully rendered, and their costume is always the focal point of the canvas, the current painting being no exception. The paisley shawl is absolutely stunning, makes me wonder when those came to be a popular accessory.

There is of course so much more to see at this museum (Paul Mellon’s collection of British sporting art, for one, as well as lots of antiquities, Fabergé eggs, and mod-con selections), so if you have a chance, go and experience their collection for yourself. Plus, it’s FREE to get in! Doesn’t get any better than that, folks.

[insert clever title here]: Part Three

Let’s call this room five:

Bartolomeo Montagna, Christ with Mary Magdalene, and Sts John the Baptist and Jerome, c. 1492.

I think the thing that really captured my attention while looking at this altarpiece was the artist’s understanding of the human form, and how he understood the realistic depiction of it. Because if you look at all the bits separately, they work quite well on their own. But when they are reunited with all the other parts, they don’t make for a very convincing whole. Even though there is an attempt at depicting three-dimensionality in all the forms, they never seem to be able to break out of the two-dimensional medium that they’re in. It’s possible, totally, as we’ll see later in the following centuries (even in the 1500s with Holbein), but here it’s always missed. Maybe there was too much emphasis on perfection, who knows.

Regardless, I love this painting not only because of those attempts at precision and believable corporeality, but also because I really like seeing the different ways that Jerome is depicted in different settings. Sometimes you see him as full-on woodland hermit, bare-chested with rock in hand, kneeling in front of a cross, his vestments behind him, or otherwise, in his study, the lion resting at his feet. Less frequently, you find him still wearing his red cardinal robes. Here, he’s not half-dressed, nor in his study, but wearing a gray hooded cloak with only his cardinal’s hat at his feet, and the lion (looking more like a lynx) a bit further away from him. John the Baptist still looks a bit stiff and scary, though. :(

Moving on…

!!!!!!!!!

Lorenzo Lotto CAN paint after all! This was a definite shock when I saw it then, and now as I’m going through my film again, I’m surprised anew. I saw a lot of his portraits at one time in one exhibition a few years ago (“The Renaissance Face” at the National Gallery, London) and I was not impressed by his skills (i.e. a lack of differentiation in the characteristics of his sitters, a general clumsiness when depicting wrists and hands, and everything looked… well, the same, but not in a good way). I guess it’s safe to say that he’s a better history painter than portraitist. These two panels from a triptych really proved otherwise (St. Sebastian on the left, St. Christopher on the right, both from 1531). It’s also a good comparison to the painting that I just talked about, because here, I see nothing life and energy. Stiffness and absolute linear brushstrokes are but a distant memory. Sebastian in particular caught my attention as his pose makes me think that Lotto was looking at a corpse that was hung up with his arm above his head: the tension of the muscles in the ribcage area is especially telling and seems to suggest this. Both canvases are lovely and really worth a good staring at.

Grabbing good art by the horns (part two)

Room 2 (and beyond probably):

Since I was trying to focus on looking (really, really looking, like at serious details looking), I didn’t take as many pictures of everything in the room that caught my eye. This was definitely the beginning of taking photos of “‘Whaaa?’ Moments in Art,” which I think proved to be a more entertaining endeavor. 

The photograph of the caption was sadly blurry, so I can’t really tell you who painted this, but it’s your standard crucifixion scene in tempera on wood with gold ground, late 14th century. I seem to have some sort of Mary Magdelene fixation, or at least she’s the one figure in art history who consistently provides entertaining images that appeal to me, because here she is again, pre-hairy hermit phase. I think that I found it interesting that the artist chose to portray her as basically hugging the base of the cross. As I was to see from later examples, he was not the only one to show her as doing such, so it must have been part of her (not-so-standard) iconography.

This painting (bordering on icon) I found to be particularly interesting. It’s not quite a Virgin Hodegetria (“She who shows the way”), but I would say that she comes pretty close to being one (the right hand just needs to be lifted from her knee and we’d be set). Thing is, it’s from Florence in the 1270s, although looking at it makes me think that it came directly from Byzantium from this time or earlier. From the symmetry of the oddly proportioned angels, to the standard throne, to the stiffly, yet precisely rendered folds in the drapery, and even further to the overwhelming presence of gold, it’s all tell-tale early Christian icon. The face of Mary is a bit more softly painted than the other examples from Constantinople at this time, but the angle that her head is craned at, her long nose and almond-shaped eyes, as well as just the colors of her clothing generally do not suggest Florence at this time (maybe Ravenna, if anything, which was actually the capital of the Eastern Empire for a short time). It really made me wonder about the influence of this style of painting on the rest of European art. You can see this, of course, in Duccio’s altarpieces, etc. and Giotto was still another 30 years away from making his mark on the world, so I guess it’s not all that bizarre. But it just seemed out of place. Especially when you compare it to this triptych:

(Master of San Gaggio, Triptych, 1275/85)

Generally, the identical iconography, yet with a slightly less generalized face (on Mary, at least). OK, maybe not less generalized, as it’s plenty of that, but she doesn’t look like she’s just stepped out of every single icon produced in the Byzantime Empire in the 1200s.

Following Rooms:

This is a fine example of “When Bad Art Happens to Good Artists”: Piero della Francesca, maker of so many amazing works of art (The Baptism of Christ, The Resurrection, anything featuring Federico da Montefeltro), somehow managed to produce this. It’s A Landscape with St. Jerome from 1450, and I sincerely hope that it looks like this due to damage or being unfinished. Hope, hope, hope.

Moving on to “When Good Art Happens to Great Artists”: Mantegna!! This is his Presentation of Christ at the Temple, 1465/66. It’s always such a joy to look at Mantegna’s works, even if sometimes they come off as looking a bit stiff, there is still such an amazing level life that seeps through. I love his use of white chalk to highlight the limbs and other areas (at least I think it’s white chalk). Amazing. And the way he does lips? Stunning.